Schoolyard beatings. Racist threats. Recent headlines show that one of the main problems that schools have had for decades is school violence. Violence in schools must be stopped for it is escalating and becoming more severe every year. Violence in schools may result in suicides, injuries to innocent students, and distraction from their school work. Bullying or intimidation is a form of violence and can eventually lead to suicides.
Suicide is the leading cause of death in youths ages 15-24. The incidence is higher here in Canada than in the United States. While girls attempt more frequently than boys, they use less violent measures like drug overdoses or slitting their wrists. Boys attempt less often and are generally more successful than girls, as they shoot themselves, jump off of buildings or hang themselves.
Victims of bullying go home worried, depressed and afraid of what will happen the next day. Emmett Fra lick was a boy who shot himself because of the constant bullying of two girls. Girls can also be as nasty as boys can, although the stereotype does not show so. Dawn-Marie Wesley of Vancouver hung herself in her basement out of fear of girls who had been threatening to kill her. Name calling and verbal abuse also constitute bullying. Hamed Nast oh jumped off a bridge to his death due to the continuous teasing of his peers.
Names such as “faggot” were used. Suicides are preventable; outreach by the community can help children who lack family support and attention. School violence often results in the injury and bloodshed of the innocent. Students may get picked on because they are different and cannot defend themselves. More often, students get involved in a minor conflict that is “solved” through violence.
Reena Virk from Vancouver had merely looked in another girl’s diary and called some boys in it. She found out the party she was invited to a few days later was a planned attack. She was brutally beaten and then drowned by six girls and a boy. Although Reena Virk was not innocent, she committed a crime that should not have cost her life.
Garrett Holstine befriended a person who was unique and “different” but had to face .”.. severe physical and mental abuse from the people around him,” and “did not know how to fight back or express his feelings to anyone except his closest friends.” Any injury to an innocent person is unwarranted and does not improve someone’s reputation. Garrett Holstine writes “So the next time you see the ‘not-so-cool’ person getting pushed around, put yourself in their shoes.”.